1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to a system and method for generating and transmitting a book of reports over a computer network, and, more particularly, to a system and method for enabling a user to generate/retrieve related reports to form a book of reports concerning a particular subject matter, and transmit the book of reports to the user.
2. Background of the Related Art
There are literally thousands of Web sites (“sites”) on the Internet that provide information related to the healthcare industry. The sites range from those that are oriented toward researchers involved in research and development of drug products, to manufacturers and retailers of medical equipment and products, to healthcare providers, to consumers. The uses for the information available on the Internet are as varied as the number of users that seek the information.
As an example, professionals involved in research and development of the latest pharmaceutical products may turn to sites such as Pharmaprojects Online (www.ovid.com), Pharmaceutical News Index (www.ovid.com), or DataStarWeb (products.dialog.com/products/datastarweb) to obtain information relevant to their research. On the other hand, healthcare providers in clinics or hospitals may turn to sites such as MedMarket.com (www.medmarket.com) for information concerning operating room products or testing equipment, or BuyMed.com (www.buymed.com) for information concerning more mundane medical products such as stethoscopes and walkers. Furthermore, consumers seeking information related to an illness, injury, or their general health may turn to sites such as Tufts Nutrition Navigator® (navigator.tufts.edu) for nutrition information or National Health Information Center (nhic-nt.health.org) for information concerning how to get in touch with healthcare professionals.
In searching for, retrieving, and organizing information found on the Internet, there are significant shortcomings in the present systems and methods that are available. For example, when drug researchers conduct research on the Internet to determine a market in which they should develop a new drug, they must collect vast quantities of information from a myriad of resources and carefully prepare a comprehensive, yet well organized catalogue of data. The ultimate decision as to how the development project should proceed depends in great part on the completeness, accuracy, and understandability of the collected information.
An analogous situation arises when a consumer conducts research on the Internet to obtain information concerning an illness, injury, or his general health. During the consumer's research, numerous sites may be reviewed to obtain a collection of articles, reports, and related information. Thereafter, the information is printed out. The consumers must then spend a significant amount of time sifting and sorting through the printed information to organize and decipher the material.
Of course, for both researchers and consumers, it would be preferable if the time spent on searching for, gathering, and organizing the information were applied to actually reading and scrutinizing the information itself. However, at the present time, the information must first be searched for, gathered, and organized before any meaningful review can be conducted.
Attempts have been made to simplify the process of searching for, gathering, and organizing information from the Internet and other database sources by researchers. For example, BizInt Smart Charts for Pharmaceuticals (BizInt Solutions, Orange, Calif.) is a program that provides a user the ability to download information and organize it into tabular reports. However, there are a limited number of sources from which the information may be obtained. In addition, the system runs on a standalone computer, therefore, all information that is to be organized must first be retrieved, for example, from sources on the Internet, and downloaded into the program. Furthermore, the output is a collection of reports. That is, the program does not provide any mechanism for organizing the resulting reports. Consequently, a user is left with a significant amount of work including searching for and collecting information, downloading the collected information into the program, and organizing the resulting reports that are output by the program.
Attempts have also been made to reduce the complexity of collecting and organizing information from the Internet by consumers. For example, the site drkoop.com® (www.drkoop.com) provides a variety of healthcare related information. The site includes healthcare news, commentary from professionals in the industry, and other health related resources scattered throughout the site. A significant disadvantage of the site is that a consumer has to search throughout the entire site in order to find information relating to his interest. In addition, there is no facility for organizing the information that is found.
The site WebMD.com (www.webmd.com) also provides a variety of healthcare related information. As with the drkoop.com®, WebMD.com includes healthcare news, commentary from professionals in the industry, and other health related resources scattered throughout the site. WebMD.com includes basically the same disadvantages as drkoop.com® in that the consumer has to search throughout the entire site in order to find information relating to his interest. In addition, there is no facility for organizing the information that is found.
From the above, it is understood that a system and method is needed to more effectively assist professionals and consumers to focus their searches for information over the Internet. In addition, a system and method is needed to allow professionals and consumers to quickly review and organize their search results. Furthermore, a system and method is needed that is easy to operate and readily integrated into the various technical systems and methods presently employed by professionals and consumers.